Highlighting our ketamine therapy patients here on our blog has been incredibly rewarding for us at The Good Drop.
It isn’t because our patients’ journeys have been easy or linear. It’s specifically because those journeys have not been easy, and yet our patients keep showing up, keep doing the work, keep at it even when things get tough.
Just ask our patient Victoria, who’s been receiving ketamine therapy for deeply entrenched anxiety and depression since October 2024. Although she has experienced measurable relief since then, some infusions have dredged up old stressors, and breakthrough symptoms have occasionally returned.
But Victoria has stayed consistent with treatment, and we’re all so proud of the progress she’s making. This is particularly impressive when you consider Victoria once believed she was beyond all help, having tried all the more traditional methods of mental healthcare.
If you’ve been considering ketamine therapy for your own anxiety or depression, read Victoria’s story below. We have found it sometimes takes learning about someone else’s struggles to make sense of your own and ultimately seek the help you need.
From Childhood
It can be difficult to pinpoint where and when mental health struggles begin, but Victoria has a fairly clear memory of hers.
“I was young when I noticed something was wrong,” she said. “Definitely around 9 or 10. I wasn’t sure what was wrong. I just knew I wasn’t happy like a kid my age should be. I was 14 when I finally opened up to someone about it. I went to my sister, and we went to our parents. I explained how I was sad all the time for no reason. I didn’t enjoy the things that I used to. I couldn’t concentrate in school. Life just seemed unfair only to me.”
Victoria saw a child psychologist, who sent her home with the more-than-500-question Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory (MMPI) to test her for various mental disorders. The results led to diagnoses of ADHD, generalized anxiety disorder, and major depressive disorder.
“I can picture myself at 14,” Victoria recalled. “Back in that office. Hearing that. ‘What do I do now? What does this mean? How do I get better? Why did this happen to me?’”
Initial Treatments
Victoria was referred to a psychologist for talk therapy and to a psychiatrist for medication.
Initially, therapy wasn’t for her. “I certainly gave that poor therapist a hard time. I didn’t talk. I didn’t react. I shrugged. I listened. But she didn’t give up on me. She didn’t nag, which I appreciated, and eventually, in my own time, I slowly opened up. I’d cry, we’d laugh, I’d draw, paint, write, and we’d walk around town. I saw her as a friend. She was full of life and helped me when I thought I was beyond help.”
That psychologist later stopped taking Victoria’s insurance, and that’s where the relationship unfortunately ended. Victoria bounced around to various other therapists for a while but never connected with them on anything approaching the same level as the first one.
Meanwhile, Victoria found the psychiatric experience less than stellar. “I’d be started on the highest doses of medications they chose, scheduled for a follow-up, tell the nurse practitioner my side effects, and then the meds would be changed like they were candy. That’s absolutely a time in my life I do not look back on fondly. I’ll never forget the day I went to my mom a couple weeks into taking Zoloft and told her I felt empty. She held me while I cried. I’d never wish that experience on anyone. Especially a mother.”
Eventually, the Zoloft evened out, and Victoria felt decent. Not necessarily happy, but well enough. “The symptoms were outwardly covered,” she said, “but inside, I suffered in silence because I didn’t want to inconvenience anyone and certainly didn’t want to have my meds changed again.”
It’s a real dilemma that many of our patients face. Traditional antidepressants aren’t cure-alls. Talk therapy isn’t for everyone. Situations like these can be incredibly frustrating and demoralizing for people who just need some genuine relief.
Fortunately, there are still more options.
Into the Unknown
Victoria is 31 now, meaning she’s been maintaining “normalcy” using Zoloft for well over half her life. Despite that, she believes the antidepressant is far from perfect for her.
“The best way to describe how Zoloft works for me is like a band aid. It masks the symptoms but never truly eases them. I feel better than when I wasn’t on it, but it doesn’t feel authentic. With Zoloft alone, nothing excited me, nothing surprised me, nothing got me out of bed to greet the day with a smile or try something new. My body and mind had been on autopilot for so long that I stopped seeing life as something precious.”
Then, Victoria heard about ketamine therapy at The Good Drop from someone she knows. The story went that this psychedelic drug could help those with medication-resistant depression. She wondered if that applied to her.
“I always felt like the only options available to help with depression were antidepressants and therapy. Fourteen-year-old me did enough medication-switching to last the rest of my life. I don’t want to deal with those side effects anymore. Ketamine seemed like finally another option.”
Victoria had her first ketamine infusion in October 2024.
“I was a little nervous for my first infusion, but I was more intrigued and hopeful. The experience itself is hard to describe. I go in and out of the world around me. When I’m in it, I’m chatty and fairly giggly. When I’m out of it, I see different colors and shapes. I hear different people. I feel like I’m floating or flying in some back alley of my mind that I locked away and refused to look at, and now I’m being made to see it, face it, make sense of it.”
Of course, mental health is a sensitive field where patients often have to make themselves vulnerable to start feeling better – what our co-owner Mara Capozzi, RN calls the need to “feel to heal.”
Respecting someone’s vulnerability in those moments is what gives them the space to work things out with the help of ketamine therapy. We’ve certainly done our best to show Victoria the gold standard of care since she started with us.
“Nurses who genuinely love being nurses are the angels of the medical field,” Victoria said. “Mara and Kelly are two perfect examples. They were and continue to be positive, helpful, and encouraging. They were the reason I felt comfortable enough to answer the Columbia-Suicide Severity Rating Scale (C-SSRS) honestly for the first time since I was 14. Every therapist used to ask if I ever felt suicidal and warned me that if I said yes, they wouldn’t be able to treat me. Other medical professionals always made me feel crazy regarding my mental health. Kelly and Mara make me feel normal. Like someone heard me and understood me. Like they could see that I wanted help and support even before I became a patient. Their personalities are so authentically kind that I sometimes forget what I’m even in the office for. My heroes wear scrubs.”
A New World
We’ve said it before and will continue saying that ketamine is not a catch-all solution to everyone’s mental health problems. Individuals can respond to the same medication wildly differently. At The Good Drop, we enjoy a 98.2% effectiveness rate with ketamine therapy, but its success with patients is by no means guaranteed.
So, we asked Victoria about the changes she’s noticed in herself since starting ketamine treatments, both in the short and long term.
“It sounds so insignificant, but dealing with anxiety makes it hard for me to make eye contact. After my first few infusions, I was making eye contact, smiling, and saying hello to coworkers. I’m not like that! I also noticed I was feeling better overall. Just relaxed. Like I belong and I’m supposed to be here. I don’t want to ‘wrap this up’ anymore because I’ve noticed that I want to experience so much more of life. All just from the first couple infusions.”
And more long term?
“I’m overall happier and relaxed. I’m known to be a fast walker, but I’ve slowed down. I’ve calmed down. I’m patient. I’m seeing things from new perspectives. I catch myself wearing my hair up and wearing brighter colors. I almost cried when my answer on the C-SSRS went from ‘Yes, I wish to be dead’ to ‘No, I don’t wish to be dead.’ I’m so grateful, and I’m looking forward to life and what I’ll do tomorrow.”
We asked Victoria what she would say to someone in a similar position to hers prior to starting ketamine therapy.
“I’ll always encourage someone to reach out, even just to talk to someone at the office,” she said. “See what’s up. See what they offer. See how they can help. Do yourself that favor. Fourteen-year-old me – being diagnosed with major depressive order while her world crashed around her – would also want you to do that.”
The Good Drop Is Your Ketamine Therapy Center in the Wilkes-Barre & Scranton Area
Victoria’s story, like so many others we’ve heard, inspires us every day to keep going. We know our area of Northeastern Pennsylvania has been wanting for quality mental healthcare like this. We’re humbled to hear from patients like Victoria, people who felt hopeless before and who now see that glimmer of hope again after starting ketamine treatments.
Contact The Good Drop to learn more about our offerings or schedule a consultation.